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transgender day of remembrance

Two years ago I wrote this post when I came out publicly as transgender. Hard to believe that was two years ago. I thought of that post as my first and last coming out. I did it. My heart was pounding as I hit that post button but it was done and I felt a huge weight being lifted off my shoulders. Everyone knew my business so it was no longer something people would question. But… as time goes on you meet new people. People at work or etc that don’t know your past.. and therefore the process starts all over again.

One of my biggest fears is that when other people find out I’m trans is that they will see me differently. As something other than just another guy. People seem to look at you differently once they find out. It is almost as if they look at you longer, trying to think of what you used to look like, or what is in your pants… or maybe it is genuine curiosity. I get that, humans are curious beings.

I’m just another guy, just another human who has a different than average past. I’ve seen two different worlds without having to travel a mile but, just like you I go to work, I live, breathe, and bleed the same. I can be fun, hard working, loving, and let’s be real…I can be an asshole, but don’t make that judgement just based on me being transgender.

I struggle daily thinking about attending church or just meeting random people that if they knew of my transition perhaps they would not accept me or want me to be there. Which also leads me to wonder… for those of which transitioning is against their beliefs what would be your hope for me today? If you were to pray for my soul and salvation, what would that prayer look like?

I can’t help but wonder.

All in all, what matters most is that I accept myself and I am finally in a place where I can say that I do. It is transgender awareness month, but ironically I found myself doing something I never thought that I would. I started deleting old photos of myself from Facebook so that new people from my life wouldn’t find out I was trans. The truth is that my past has made me who I am today and I will continue to be proud of that. Being trans has made me a more accepting and compassionate person. It has taught me that you cannot judge someone based on their past or ever know what someone is truly going through on the inside.

I knew who I was when I was little, but somewhere down the road I let fear of what others thought of me get in the way.

This is a pretty drastic comparison photo… but it just shows that you really can not ever know what someone is going through just by looking at them.

On the left: My wedding day. The day I completely lost myself.

The right: My first bodybuilding competition. The day I stepped on stage completely exposed in order to heal from all those days of hiding.

It is transgender awareness month, and today specifically marks the 16th annual International Transgender Day of Remembrance. It is a day to memorialize and honor transgender persons who have lost their lives to murder, or suicide.

226 transgender people were murdered this year. All because of their gender identity. It is hard to believe the hatred that exists in this world. Many have fought long and hard in an effort to beat homophobia. While we are making great strides in ending homophobia and working towards equality, people are failing to realize that transphobia is real, and strides to overcome it are much shorter.

There are many transgender people that live among you. Although they are not as visible of a community… they are there. Transgender people often struggle just to make it through a day. Maybe they are fearing that someone will find out their secret, perhaps they may be unsafe, or fear that they may face ridicule. In some cases they face so much hardship that they opt out of life all together.

Being transgender is not easy. I feel so sad for those that have lost their lives. It is unfair that their lives were ended prematurely. Life is short..and because of this I am choosing to live mine more honest, open, and true. I feel the only way we can bring change and progress is to be proud, tell our stories, and share with people in order to help educate them.

To my co-workers, I am Amber. I am a quiet twenty-something lesbian. To my close friends, I am Codi. A twenty-something female to male transgender. I have always been a boy, but somewhere along the lines nature betrayed me.

I’m the boy on the right…

The boy on the right of the soccer ball.

Bottem left. I don’t know what I am looking at…

I thought I was a boy most of my life. I passed as a boy… and no one knew any different unless my parents told them. I hated the usual girly things like wearing a dress.( I hated going to church on Sunday because of this! ) I played with G.I. Joe’s and wanted to do everything my brother did. Puberty was an incredibly hard and confusing time.

Long story short, because of my religious beliefs somewhere around my second year of college I tried fitting into what I thought I had to be. I started to try and dress a little more feminine… and dated a guy who I ended up marrying and then divorcing three years later. I soon came out as gay but shortly after started realizing that there was something else going on. I wasn’t gay… I was transgender. I was born in the wrong body. This is only a very short version of my story, but the most important part is that this is my truth. 226 people lost their lives this year for living their truth. I am grateful to still be living a life on this earth, and I am going to live it proudly as my authentic self. I am Codi. And I am transgender.